Snow and prison.

Tonight, snow falls at Washington, making this loud, swaggering, bellicose city momentarily quiet, still and peaceful. It is peaceful and beautiful to watch snow fall. Sunshine makes us merry enough and rain sad, but snow, making its quiet descent, is a marvel of nature to watch.

In this neighborhood at Washington, one may as well be in the deep country. There is never a sound, not even a car passing, after 10 pm, if that late, and that is, in part why, the Spring Valley is called, The Happy Valley, by its lucky denizens.

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Watching the snow, I thought of school.

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Why did I think of school, I wonder?

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Think of school?

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What a dreadful thought to have tonight!!!

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Perhaps I thought of school because, when we were small, we would peek at the snow late at night, watching, praying, that it would be deep enough to give us tomorrow off from school.

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Yes, that must be why I thought of school while watching the snow this night.

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School is prison.

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Grownups tell us that school prepares us for life itself.

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Grown up life itself is, most certainly, a prison.

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Given this, it is incumbent upon us to ask:

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“Why do I need to go to baby prison for so long a time at school to prepare me to go to grown up prison for life downtown in city when I get out of school?”

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Watching the snow tonight at Washington in fine company, tops among that company a warm snifter, or more, of a, very nice, champagne cognac, I, by utter happenstance, met a man who sat by me and said to me, one of my snifters in his hand:

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“Begg, I was a very successful student. From the start, I loved school, hit the books hard, engaged my teachers, took high marks, and did all the things that allowed me to go up to Haa~vad and come back down summa.”

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I know beyond an unreasonable doubt that there is no point in engaging such a man in conversation on any topic of interest, at any level.

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I do wonder though, how he came to join our little company of warm and contented snow birds here tonight.

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I do not know him, I do not think.

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But then again, I do know him.

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He is the sort of man who, without prompting and with gai alacrity, admits to loving:

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Prison.

If the snow is long and deep tonight, I hope the supply of fine champagne cognac is likewise bountiful.

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And I now think of a movie about the snow and send with this note, a clip, from the end of that production:

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Panics over snow do break out here at Washington. I can remember some pretty deep snows here over the years–maybe 2 feet or so the biggest–that closes this city down for many days–particularly on the side streets–so, there have been some big ones, it’s just that, as with everything else at my age, I can’t remember exactly the dates of big snow storms..or, for that matter, much of anything else..time rushes on and leaves vague memories–the snow is pretty to watch coming down now though–I don’t think this is going to be all that big a snow, of course one never knows, but it sure is pretty–in the quiet of the night.

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Very quiet and peaceful..in the quiet of the night, the snow makes a wondrous silent noise as it falls…in the quiet of the night.

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As I watch this snow I am thinking of a pictorially gorgeous movie.

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I am watching it now, The Dead, derivative of Mr Joyce’s The Dubliner’s, a movie which of course nobody watched, at the end of which, the husband stands at the window and says:

The rich man ought not be taxed at all~~he ought be compelled to employ and train the poor man~~directly~~personally.

~~The principal need in America today is~~financial and industrial De-Globalization~~to facilitate the promotion of the possibility for the average man to get and keep a good job with good benefits paid by the employer~~as was done not very long ago.~~

~~Bene Nati, Bene Vestiti, Et Mediocriter Docti~~

~

~~La crema y nata~~

~

~~Artista de la conquista~

~~In sunshine and in shadow~~I hold tight to the Republican view of time and money~~I write night and day~~yet~~while impecunious~~I am vastly overpaid~~in that taking pay to do what I love is unfair~~to my employer~~in a fair system~~under such circumstances~~I should pay him~~not he me~~I am far, far too old a man to be sexually confused~~praise Jesus~~but I am yet young enough to be politically confused~~is anyone not~~in an absolute sense~~I am a Catholic Royalist~~in a practical sense~~I am a Classical Liberal~~a Gaullist~~a Bonapartist~~an American Nationalist Republican~~in either sense~~my head is soon for the chopping block~~to hasten my interlude with Madame La Guillotine~~I write without fear~and without favor of~any man~~

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Finis Origine Pendet…

The escape commences…

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September, 1957

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Saint Jane Frances de Chantal Catholic parochial school, called, by anyone of any background, simply: “Chan~al,” a place where, of an autumn day in 1957, school, for me, began and ended in the first convening of the first grade in which a tiny nun, one Sister Dom Bosco, appeared before me, just behind the window appearing at far left of this photograph, and piped out this: “I may be small, but so then, is the Atom Bomb.”

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My determination to escape school commenced immediately on hearing about this Atom Bomb business and took 16 dicey and arduous years to finally accomplish.~~

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"Jean-Marie Le Pen is a friend. He is dangerous for the political set because he's the only one who's sincere. He says out loud what many people think deep down, and what the politicians refrain from saying because they are either too demagogic or too chicken. Le Pen, with all his faults and qualities, is probably the only one who thinks about the interests of France before his own."~~
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